As he prepares to host Comic Relief for the final time, Sir Lenny Henry reflects on the changing face of comedy, the politics of charity – and why he owes it all to his mum
Comic Relief: Funny for Money
Friday 7.00pm BBC1, 10.00pm BBC2
To understand Sir Lenny Henry’s 39-year association with Comic Relief, you need to go back to his late mother, Winifred. “My mum was always very strict about giving back,” he explains. “She had three jobs, but she was always helping other people. Whenever she came home from bingo, and she’d won, she would return with a quarter of the money because people would be like [he adopts a thick Jamaican accent], ‘Miss Winnie, Miss Winnie, I need to buy some carpet.’ ‘Miss Winnie, I need to fix me wig!’” He flashes a grin. “Even though she didn’t have much money herself, whatever she had, she’d give. And that lives on in me.”
If the 65-year-old comedian, actor, author, screenwriter and PhD-holding knight of the realm sounds in reflective mood then that is to be expected. As he announced to much shock and surprise in January, this year’s Red Nose Day will be the last to feature him hosting Comic Relief ’s showpiece televised broadcast. After almost four decades as the grinning face, indefatigable spirit and beating empathetic heart of one of the most successful charity initiatives and pop cultural juggernauts in British history, he is stepping back. But he’s also keen to offer some context – and to quieten the gasps from those who think he is severing all ties with a charity that he has been associated with since its inception in 1985.
“It’s an interesting time,” he says, a little wearily, looking trim and youthful as he Zooms in from a nondescript meeting room at his new production company offices. “When you see your picture in the paper and it says, ‘Lenny’s done 39 years on Comic Relief and he’s not going to host it any more…’ well, it’s not the full story. The full story is that I’m not going to host on the night, but I’m the life president of Comic Relief, along with Kevin Cahill, who is the former CEO, and we’ll still do stuff behind the scenes. I just won’t be there on the night in a red suit doing stuff that I was doing when I was 26.”
Henry’s continued commitment to Comic Relief ’s infectious, philanthropic spirit and the causes it funds in Africa and the UK becomes abundantly clear over the course of our conversation. But so too does the sense that, after all the years of marathon fundraisers, autocue disasters, emotionally bruising dispatches from African slums and codpiece-thrusting performances alongside bemuse
